Physical Pain defeats emotional pain every time!

OMG – Pain! Yeah so I was volunteering at the ranch yesterday but was having a supremely horrible emotional day, despite my happy face when in public, so just wanted to stay there and work as long as possible. I stayed from 8am to 1pm. I figured physical pain would feel better than the emotional pain, right? Wrong! I did a lot and yeppers, didn’t realize how much extra until maybe 4 hours after I got home. I was playing cards with the ladies and started feeling the pain in my lower back/left hip area. It was manageable but slowly increasing. Fortunately we stopped playing before it got incapacitating.

I got home and when I tried sitting on the couch – holy crap!!!! It took a bit of time to ease in to the sitting position but I did. The pain kept increasing no matter what but coloring and TV helped. I took acetaminophen but it never kicked in.

Bed time – so much pain – I tried a heating pad but that made it exponentially worse. I don’t use cold packs because that usually causes more pain too. I actually wondered if I ought to go to the emergency room. At this point it was throbbing stabbing pains in my hip (even though it’s actually my lower back). Anyone else would probably have been hollering but with my loads of pain experience I simply laid there trying to figure out what to do. I had some lidocaine gel for something else so I rubbed that on in hopes it might mute it a little but it didn’t seem to make a difference at first. It must have tamed it a tiny bit because eventually I did fall asleep (after 2 hours). I decided that if it was as severe in the morning, then I’d seek help.

This morning. I can move around (meaning get coffee) which is always a good thing. I still have pain that feels like a butcher knife in my hip so mobility isn’t all that great but it doesn’t warrant a trip to the ER which honestly would be a, um, pain in my ass… hahaha (can still pun so I guess it’s not all that bad). I know it will progressively get worse today but I can deal with it. How do I know? Experience. Last night I was fearing it was a spinal compression fracture, which happens with osteoporosis, but even though it is still very painful this morning, it isn’t as acute so I’m assuming it isn’t a fracture. I’m going for a massage tomorrow too.

The thing is, I did a lot of extra things at the ranch so I don’t know which caused it. I think it was when I took the tack off one of the horses. Next week I’ll muck stalls and everything else and not handle tack, and then see. If I’m in excruciating pain next week then I’ll know it wasn’t the tack. Dealing with pain is always a long term experiment, isn’t it? Ugh.

I did figure out this isn’t a spasm. In the past, when I had spasms, they went away. This is not going away. This is not an unfamiliar pain by the way. It happens with movements, the wrong movements. I’ve yet to figure out exactly what those movements are though. It’s hard to isolate a movement so we are always freaking moving!

The upside is all that other crapola in my head is muted. There is nothing like pain to simplify everything. I’m not talking bruise or headache, I’m talking debilitating pain.

Having said all this, I started writing this post maybe 2 hours ago. Write, get coffee, write, do dishes, write have breakfast… that’s me. My pain, as mentioned, is getting worse. I realize now that all the fear of a compression fracture was wasted since the pain isn’t located on my spine, per se. That’s a relief. I’m going back to the ranch today to help with a group that is coming in. It’ll be different because I’ll mostly be standing there helping people with how to groom, and pulling horses out for people to walk. No labor. I’m suspecting I’ll be in less pain standing up.

Eating Disorder Update

I’m supposed to add food when I go to the ranch: an additional bread and lipid. I managed that yesterday but last evening I ended up binging on peanut butter.Â Binge = 3 Tbsp or so, just for clarification.Â I was in such extreme pain I feel ashamed that I turned to food for comfort. I’m betraying my anorexic rules… grrrr. I ended up purging. I’m back on track today but less motivated honestly. My weight has not budged. It has been dead level since I got my scale. It fluctuates by 0.1 only. That doesn’t help. I haven’t told my nutritionist. If I see no change in, say, a month, I’ll mention it.

9 thoughts on “Physical Pain defeats emotional pain every time!”

I’ve had excruciating pain the last two days, partly in my lower back, which is more intense that the usual daily aches and pains I get. I can definitely see where you’re coming from – physical pain does have a way of overshadowing emotional pain and knocking everything else out. I think you should go easy on yourself though when it comes to eating because pain, of any kind, can be incredibly hard to manage with an eating disorder. The main thing is you’re being reflecting, you’re learning, you’re trying again each day. Just want to send a hug your way and hope the pain eases…. Caz x

I mean it. Please take care of yourself. We’re often our own worse critics, and we’d never talk to others the way we talk to ourselves nor would we want them to go through the same pain or ED-related thoughts and behaviours. xx

X pain is a binge trigger for me, I try and just forgive myself and start fresh and whenever I can find that kindness it’s great!!! we’re just humans doing our best – I hope you can be kind to yourself too X omg tho – there is a lot of heavy lifting in yard work isn’t there? Even with all my Alexander technique skills, regular Epsom salt baths (if you haven’t tried this yet please treat yourself ASAP!) and yoga and I ALWAYS ended up with aches and pains… And TOTALLY try eat the extra food!!!! You need it!!! There’s all the physical work of the yard and on top of that the Amount of energy it takes to stay present and alert and emotionally regulate !! I do not regret a single hard won crumb from the days I worked at the yard!!! A friend of mine sent me a photo of me and my fave pony Maxwell!!! I’m going to post it so you can see him!!!! Feast your eyes friend xxx Em

Baths used to be integral in my pain management but I no longer have a bathtub. In my new apartment I only have a walk-in shower.
I can’t wait to see your pony! People were taking pictures of me walking one of the horses, or rather, they were taking pictures of the horse. I was hoping they had one with me but I just got one with my legs, lol. I’ll post it too. 👍😃

I just looked up that cushion, cool. I would have considered something like that before this mornings massage but now, ugh. It increased my pain by 10 times. She’s extraordinary though and it did feel better when she worked on it. She let me know exactly where the problem connective tissue area is and how to help myself at home but wow. I should have remembered that she doesn’t massage to make a person feel pleasant; she works on the problems so that over time it improves. Ah well, it was a painful 2 1/2 hour drive!

I’m having a wee break right now from program and had to go out to my car to get some acetaminophen. 😔

The good news is that tomorrow it’ll be less and even more so the following day so it’s all good. Go me for long term experience with pain, lol. 👍😎